BALLON D' OR: Qatar coach, captain & media voted for Cristiano Ronaldo as favour for Sepp Blatter

The above quote – so far only appearing online in Arabic – will come as little surprise to anyone who follows world football.

And, it should be pointed out that plenty of the voting for the Ballon d’Or was spurious to say the least.

See: Cristiano Ronaldo voted for Falcao, Bale and Özil; Lionel Messi voted for Iniesta, Xavi and Neymar.

Ballon d’Or votes: Liverpool’s Gerrard & Srktel picked Suarez, Spurs’ Lloris went for Bale & Kompany chose Yaya & Hazard.


But, there is a fair argument saying only media should vote for the Ballon d’Or as players and officials are simply too open to either being biased or returning favours.

In the case of Qatar, it would be no surprise if Sepp Blatter called in some favours after his infamous rant about Cristiano Ronaldo at the Oxford Union

The fact the voting period was delayed after Ronaldo scored a hat-trick for Portugal in Sweden also suggests some strong pulling by Blatter.

If Qatar was a fit and proper country to host the World Cup in 2022 perhaps this would be easier to stomach!